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'Ard Boyz has never been a fixed 6 turns except for fantasy, as far as I can remember. I was unable to attend last year's, but I went the year before and before that as well.

GW likes the random game length. They think it's "tactical" to require you to jump for objectives on turn 5 and take that risk that it'll go on to turn 6 and possibly 7 and screw you over, or do the reverse and screw you over if you hold off on grabbing depending on a 6th turn and have the game end.

I agree.....but I think it should be 6 turns, with the chance on a 4+ to go longer, or continue on a 2+ instead of a 3.

I might be completely wrong, but I thought the 40k Ard Boyz missions were 6 turns as well.

I think 2 hours is plenty of time to play a 2,000 point game, BTW.

Walls wrote:I am completely baffled that people can't finish a 2k game in 2 hours. We do it regularly in club play and that's with stopping to talk to people or go grab pizza next door.

I beg to differ.

I played against foot orks game #6. We started before time kicked off, we took shortcuts to speed up gameplay (starting our turns while the other person was still doing theirs), rolled dice as fast as possible, combined movement/running - and we got through four turns in our two hours.

This was on table #1, so we had a judge (the same judge) at our table the whole game. We had zero rules disputes, no judge calls or clarifications - it was a completely smooth game. And we got through four turns. Our judge said that we played the entire thing with superhuman speed. Both of us made mistakes in our haste.

Not all armies can be played in two hours at 2,000 points. My shooting phases take a while - I have one hell of a lot of it. Ork movement and assault takes a while.

David / Foreigner...you feel like I was slow-playing you? The reason our game took longer...why my turns took longer than yours is because there was some inequalities in how we treat each other. You wanted to see every one of my dice. Anything that landed behind a building, I had to pull out for you. Every lance caused you to get down and check LOS for cover. Measurements required double-checks on your part. Even with a judge at our table. My turns didn't take longer because I slow played you, they took longer because you forced them to. On the flip side, I sat down and relaxed while you took your turns. I trusted that you weren't cheating. I didn't double-check your dice or your movements, and accepted the calls you made on cover / no cover.

I suppose that people like me break sportsmanship. I should have given you a bad game vote because you're unpleasant to play against, and are implicitly calling me a cheater every time you do one of those things. Its pretty douchy for you to attribute your actions as my fault. Except that I never hand out bad sportsmanship scores...because I have thick skin. The crap I put up with doesn't really bother me, and I don't have trouble wading through it or giving people the benefit of the doubt.

I keep wanting to play you at tournaments, dash, but something [coughspacewolvescough] always kills my score before I can be put against you. Hopefully one of these days I'll catch a break and not have to deal with my nemesis before making it to the upper tables.

Chosen Praetorian wrote:And really? An expensive as hell 2 wound model with a 5++ non-eternal warrior isnt trashy? Have you tried playing a good guard player with Paladins?

Yep, and he barely beat me, and the Paladins were not the reason why I lost.
http://blackmoors40k.blogspot.com/2011/06/slaughter-in-space-game-3-blackmoors.html

Or a dark eldar player with blaster/ravenger spam? Oh wait, let me guess. "I played them and I winz cause Im awesome and power armor is the best!" I think Ill pass on your tactical advice.

We will just have to disagree then on how effective Paladins are.

Of course your opponent lost because he was using Paladins. It has nothing do with your opponent not using cover for a 3+ save, or the fact that he deep struck half of his army so you can destroy half of it with your entire army, and then pick off the other units that come in piecemeal from reserve.

Leenus wrote:Again this is why sports scoring is stupid and why no other sport / competitive game / anything let's your opponent score your "sportsmanship"

<broadcast mode active: we are NOT going to rehash the "sportsmanship is good/bad" discussion in this thread; it is off-topic, and it will be treated as such>

CKO wrote:I think the time limit is fine and the random turn length is fine aswell. If you are setting yourself up to win on turn 6 then you are taking that 33% chance of losing. All of these people jumping on the I could of or would of won time train is not neccessary.

The problem isn't about who wins or loses. The problem with BRB RGL is that when you spend alot of time and money to travel having games end on turn 5 is pretty weak. With the greater number of all reserves starts and MSU armies coming out of the newer books you don't get alot of game in. I want satisfaction regardless of whether I win or lose.

If 7 games is not enough for you, I dont know what is.

Dashofpepper wrote:You wanted to see every one of my dice. Anything that landed behind a building, I had to pull out for you. Every lance caused you to get down and check LOS for cover. Measurements required double-checks on your part. Even with a judge at our table.

Obviously, taken to an extreme this would make for a terrible game... but especially in a close/competitive game, I like to see my opponent's rolls, and I'll double check a LOS or a measurement anytime I'm unsure about it or didn't get a good look at it. I don't think there's anything wrong with any of that... but of course, taken to extreme it would be terrible.

To me, this is another case of which side is expressing the concern... I imagine your opponent would say he wasn't doing these things unreasonably, and only the two of you (and the judge at the table) can really know.

I also don't think that doing any of the above things in a reasonable manner is implicitly calling your opponent cheating- it's simply double-checking a measurement or a LOS, and if you're still unsure, probably getting a judge to check it. As for not marking down an opponent for sportsmanship if they deserve it... I think it does break the system when people always vote 100% for sportsmanship, usually hoping their opponent will do the same, regardless of what happened in the game... when other people are voting based on the actual rubric and what the guidelines ask you to do. I don't think having thick skin should be part of it- giving them the score appropriate to the game should happen no matter what.

RiTides wrote:

only the two of you (and the judge at the table) can really know.

Indeed. I disagree with him and the judge told him he was being unreasonable.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice....well, I may be twice a fool, but won't be thrice should we play again.

Blackmoor wrote:

Chosen Praetorian wrote:And really? An expensive as hell 2 wound model with a 5++ non-eternal warrior isnt trashy? Have you tried playing a good guard player with Paladins?

Yep, and he barely beat me, and the Paladins were not the reason why I lost.
http://blackmoors40k.blogspot.com/2011/06/slaughter-in-space-game-3-blackmoors.html

Or a dark eldar player with blaster/ravenger spam? Oh wait, let me guess. "I played them and I winz cause Im awesome and power armor is the best!" I think Ill pass on your tactical advice.

We will just have to disagree then on how effective Paladins are.

Of course your opponent lost because he was using Paladins. It has nothing do with your opponent not using cover for a 3+ save, or the fact that he deep struck half of his army so you can destroy half of it with your entire army, and then pick off the other units that come in piecemeal from reserve.

I will agree with you there, he is a terrible player. Im just saying I think it would be way more tactical if the game was a fixed 6 turns and take out seize the initiative. And i think paladins suck because Ive played against that army(with actual good players playing it) with Guard (which resulted in a table every time), DE(the one tie and two other tables) and Orks(Ive never lost to GKs with orks but the paladins are better against boyz, Thraka is another matter) and i just never see them being worth their points. Oh well, I do understand that it is the player and not the list. They may work better for your play style and if youre doing well with them then i see why you like them.

As far as time for game play goes:

I go to Adepticon and I spend $300+ for a plane fight, $300 for a hotel room and get ready for what could be an 8 game tournament.

Then first round I get matched up against a Dark Eldar player and I blow him off of the table. We play at a reasonable speed and I also have a small army that plays fast. We hear them shouting 15 minutes left to go in the middle of my turn during the top of the 4th. Then on his turn he flies around and takes all of the objectives and just like that I am out of the tournament for no other reason than the time ran out. If the game went on turn #5 I move my HQ to the center of the table and it is over for him.

You can read the report here:
http://blackmoors40k.blogspot.com/2011/04/demonhunters-go-to-adepticon.html

Here is the picture of the last turn. He is running on fumes and I have to get my terminators to the table center to win.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2B3qegK0rC8/TaPqvYx65cI/AAAAAAAAAJo/R4lig9fusDQ/s1600/Adepticon+2011+015.JPG

I have lost more games due to time than almost any other factor. I generally play shooting armies that like to sit back and soften up assault armies before venturing out on turn #4 and #5 to get objectives. If the game goes short, then I will lose. I can post a lot of games that cost me tournaments because they went short:
Here I am at the 'Ard Boys two years ago and I am 2-0 and blowing my 3rd round opponent off of the board when time is called. The funny thing here is that the guy who won the semi-finals I beat and would have never made the semi's if I finish that game.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/250049.page

I could go on, but you get the point.

It is possible that games ending early is the reason why certain armies do better than others in tournaments. You know how people keep saying that Orks suck? Maybe they are not tournament players and play full games where they do not do so well, but if they game is ending on turn #4 they are all of the middle of the board holding objectives.

Chosen Praetorian wrote:

Blackmoor wrote:

Janthkin wrote:So, you're playing a mission that isn't from the 5e rulebook, and is further customized even from the old "table quarters" missions of yore, and it didn't interact well with a 5e game mechanic?

And this is the fault of random game length how, again?

That is what I was going to say. You play some made up mission and it is random game lengths fault that you lost?

So if I get this right there are 2 table quarters that count for scoring? Doesn't that mean that you are contesting the one with his terminators, and you own the other giving you the win?And here is some tactical advice for you: Paladins are not a trashy squad.

I forgot to mention that when the general of your army was killed (one of your nominated HQs) then the generals from both sides were removed from the game (so the living general could question the captured one) and the side with the general that lived got 1 point. So at the end of the game I held one objective while he contested one and had the point for my HQ making it 1 to 1. And i didnt make it up. It was made by the tournament organizer. And really? An expensive as hell 2 wound model with a 5++ non-eternal warrior isnt trashy? Have you tried playing a good guard player with Paladins? Or a dark eldar player with blaster/ravenger spam? Oh wait, let me guess. "I played them and I winz cause Im awesome and power armor is the best!" I think Ill pass on your tactical advice. And no one has answered my question about whether or not Ard boyz was a fixed 6 turns.
P.S. @Boss Gutrip I had wych squads in both corners so i had both completely held. Till he deep struck that is

You missed the point. The fault in your story is on the tournament organizer for designing a bad mission; not on Random Game Length.

Yes, Ard Boyz has had some fiexed 6-turn missions. Ard Boys is also infamous for often having badly-done missions.

Janthkin wrote:

Leenus wrote:Again this is why sports scoring is stupid and why no other sport / competitive game / anything let's your opponent score your "sportsmanship"

<broadcast mode active: we are NOT going to rehash the "sportsmanship is good/bad" discussion in this thread; it is off-topic, and it will be treated as such>

I love how that my comment is "off topic" yet a good several pages of this thread are related to sports scores given at WargamesCon. The data from WargamesCon seems to only show that sports creates drama and not actually result in more gentlemanly play (example, Dash game). But flex that mod muscle.



As for the cap on timed games, I think that tournament organizers should take more of "case-by-case" basis approach to the few games that go over time. It is a flawed view to believe that games can be fairly finished in a certain time limit. One cannot accurately track the time an opponent is using per game, so there's no way to know if someone used 50% of the time or 90% of the time. Because players have to act in both turns, there's nothing stopping the other player from rolling those armor saves a bit slower / checking line of site / etc.

At big events, not all the results need to be in exactly at the X hour mark, as the results take time to enter. If a few games need some extra time to finish, why not give it to them? By the time they finish, the backlog of results entering will likely be at the point where these games can be processed. The counter argument is that people will take longer, knowing they could potentially have more time. However, if you leave it on a case-by-case basis, as determined by judges, people still have to play swiftly, as there is no guarantee they will get to play "overtime." This mechanic leaves players no worse off (they are still bound by the time limit in the worst case), but gives them the extra time to properly finish a game if the judge deems so. It happens occasionally now, but it should definitely become more of a standard.

If a game is on turn 3 when time is called, there's probably no reason to let it continue, as it's too far behind. Sometimes that happens. But it solves the issue of games on top tables ending at turn 5, when only another 20 or 30 minutes is needed to finish turn 6 or 7. There's nothing satisfying about the game being ended short, when it could be finished without slowing down the tournament.

Sports scores had no effect on the scoring for Best Overall or Best General at WGC. Sportsmanship scoring was used to determine the best Sportsman and the Golden Goat (player with the most evil army with a great sports score, determine strictly by Goatboy, who is infamous for such lists and outcomes).

Time limits will increase for next year's WGC; strange lists and unfamiliar opponents increase the time for most players, and the two newest codices eclipse all the previous codices for adding complexity to the game.

Danny Internets wrote:The tournament took place in real life, not on the internet. If people aren't comfortable with their actions being made public they should consider whether or not they should be performing those actions in the first place.

Nothing David did was shameful unless he actually did chipmunk Justin's score, and similarly nothing Justin did was shameful unless he actually intended to slow play. As usual when it comes to accusations like this, it will not and cannot be proven one way or the other. But if someone is uncomfortable with being the center of controversy they should probably not behave in a controversial manner to begin with.

These are private events, they are organized privately and you need to pay to get in, with limited access and people can be ejected at will. That's not public. Using peoples actual names on internet forums is a massive forum faux pas, and just because they were at a tournament doesn't mean it's supposed to then be broadcast just because one person thinks it's a fun little way to needle at someone, because lets be honest, that's all that is.

To Leenus: I don't think players should be given extra time... but that's just my view. It's too subjective otherwise to do it "case by case". Either there's a hard time cap or there isn't.

If someone is slow-playing, the TO should be able to enforce pretty much any penalty they want. Otherwise, it's up to the players to fit the game in... and the tournament organizers to create a format that allows people to finish their games (perhaps a slightly lower point level, or slightly longer game times, than what was done here).

Jwolf,

Glad you guys did it that way. That is an EXCELLENT mechanic! Hopefully more tournaments will follow in your footsteps with that regards.

Leenus,

What we found is that the winning players had about the same Sportsmanship scores as in past years, but the variation in the field was much greater (although not all that great, our "worst" sports scores were equivalent to an average of good games for all 7 matches), so people might have been more honest in their scoring.

But that could be a faulty conclusion, as we have only the one dataset under the new system, and there were also a lot more incomplete games (and there is some degree of correlation with sports scores and incomplete games, though certainly not 1:1). We'll see what the results look like over the next few years; by 2015 or so I think I'll be able to speak with confidence about the validity of sports scores at WGC when sports is not related to overall scoring.

In previous years, there was a deviation of 4 points of sportsmanship scoring (with a rounds being worth 47 battlepoints) in the top 30 participants, with most of the participants being in the middle, one or two 2 points up, and one or two 2 points down. And the rest of the field had little to no variation as well.

All that said, aggressively bad sportsmanship faced the same opportunity this year as in previous years, namely a chance to get to know me better under unpleasant conditions. While we discussed a few rounds with players and issued a few cautions, we had no players who had to have the bad talk with me this year, which is awesome.

All of us over at The Hogs of War had a great time. We will be returning next year.